Author: David Davies

The Supreme Court of Canada has, in a unanimous judgment rendered by Justice LeBel, ruled in favour of the taxpayers in two tax-related contractual rectification cases arising under the Civil Code of Quebec (Services Environnementaux AES and Riopel).

Both cases…

Normally, the CRA cannot collect any amount of reassessed income tax, interest or penalties while the reassessment is under objection or appeal (although CRA can collect half the reassessed amount, if the taxpayer is a large corporation). However, if there…

The Federal Court of Appeal’s recent decision in The Queen v. Guindon attempts to answer the question: when is an intentional action criminal in nature? In Guindon, the taxpayer signed 153 charitable donation receipts in what was characterized by the…

We have reported previously on the audit initiatives of the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) with respect to Tax-Free Savings Accounts (TFSAs) (http://www.thor.ca/tax-alerts/punitive-tfsa-audits/ and http://thor.ca/blog/2012/11/cra-begins-issuing-tax-free-savings-account-tfsa-reassessments/). Recent discussions and correspondence with the CRA suggest a significant expansion of those audit activities.…

Imagine that you run a successful business and report a net income of tens of thousands on revenues of several hundred thousand dollars a year. You hire a respected accounting firm to prepare your financial statements and tax returns each…

Taxpayer victories have been few and far between in the “donations in kind” world. Recently, in the Tax Court decisions in Marechaux v. The Queen (2010) and Kossow v. The Queen (2012), individuals who made donations financed in part by…

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has begun issuing assessments to holders of Tax-Free Savings Accounts (TFSAs). So far, we have seen primarily assessments issued under the authority of section 207.05 of Part XI.01 of the Income Tax Act (Canada) in…